


Cracked and Broken

by Ttttrickster (iscatterthemintimeandspace)



Series: Lessons in Healing [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: 13x18 Bring 'Em Home Alive, Blood, Coda Fics, Coda for 13X18, M/M, SPOILERS FOR 13X18, Season 13 spoilers, Spoilers, Spoilers for Season 13, Torture, Trigger Warnings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-14
Updated: 2018-04-21
Packaged: 2019-04-22 23:12:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14319159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iscatterthemintimeandspace/pseuds/Ttttrickster
Summary: “Gabriel, you have to dig yourself out of this hole. Look, I know you think it’s safer inside. No more torture, no more pain, no more expectations. I’ve been there. You were nothing like your family, you sure as hell weren’t like your dad. Me either. And just like you, I got out. Or I thought I got out. But then? Then my family needed me. And this is my life. No matter how many times I try to fight it, this is what I was put here to do. This is where I make the world a better place. And sure yeah hookers and Monte Carlo sounds great but your family needs you. Your nephew, Jack. needs you. The world needs you, we need you…Gabriel, I need you,”Coda for 13X18 "Bring 'Em Home Alive."





	1. Chapter 1

“Gabriel, you have to dig yourself out of this hole. Look, I know you think it’s safer inside. No more torture, no more pain, no more expectations. I’ve been there. You were nothing like your family, you sure as hell weren’t like your dad. Me either. And just like you, I got out. Or I thought I got out. But then? Then my family needed me. And this is my life. No matter how many times I try to fight it, this is what I was put here to do. This is where I make the world a better place. And sure yeah hookers and Monte Carlo sounds great but your family needs you. Your nephew, Jack. needs you. The world needs you, we need you…Gabriel, I need you,”  Sam paused. “So please help us.”

 

Something behind the vacant eyes stirred. 

 

Gabriel peered out from behind the carefully constructed wall he had built. Leave it to Sam fucking Winchester to be the one to pull him out again. He’d been the one who pulled him into the fray last time they’d been in trouble, so it was only fitting that he’d be the one to do it now. 

 

He didn’t want to listen, he was just fine where he was thank-you-very-much, protected from everything that had happened, but he couldn’t help it. He’d always had a soft spot for Sam and his stupid heart of gold, and he knew it. 

 

Gabriel had thought about going back, after Sam and Dean stuffed his brothers back into the cage, but he didn’t think they’d ever forgive him. He’d given them the keys, yes, but he’d run away just like before. He couldn’t face them again, and honestly after what he’d put them through, they were better off without him. 

 

Monte Carlo was a much safer choice. 

 

It was uncomplicated, no monsters, no beautifully tragic hunters who tugged his heart strings in ways he didn’t want to admit, just booze and excess and all the pornstars he could bang his way through. And even if they all reminded him of Sam in one way or another, there was no one here to call him out on it. 

 

But then they’d sold him out, the demigods who he had considered his family had given him to the last Prince of Hell. It had seemed like it was all over for him, as if he was destined to be Asmodouche’s angelic juice box for the rest of his life, but fate had landed him right back in the place where he’d been running from; fighting, destruction, and Sam Winchester’s stupid hazel eyes. 

 

He wouldn’t have blamed Sam for hating him, he wouldn’t have blamed him for making him suffer just a little, but Sam had gone and done the worst thing he could possibly do; he’d  _ forgiven _ him, and now he was standing there, begging him to come back. 

 

_ The world needs you. _

 

If it was Dean, or Castiel, he could have maybe resisted, but Sam, Sam was a different story. He always had been. Gabriel had been lost from the first moment he’d seen him on Earth, all the way back in Crawford Hall, and Gabriel was caught like a fish on a hook. 

 

No matter how much he wiggled and fought, he couldn’t seem to get away from him. 

 

Gabriel could feel the walls that had kept him safe crumbling, and with a sigh, he stepped past them, back into the crumbling vessel he’d taken all those years ago.  

 

Flashes of memory washed over him like tidal waves, knocking him back a couple of steps with each and every one. 

 

Lucifer in the Elysian Fields motel, his vessel decaying with every stinking breath. The tear that ran down his face as he stood over Gabriel’s double. _ ‘Taught me all my tricks, my ass’ _  he thought with a smirk. 

 

Monte Carlo. Hedonism in ways he hadn’t seen since the old pagan days, sex, and booze and not having to think about any of it. He could have stayed here until the end of time, wallowing in his own guilt and burying it any way he could night after night. 

 

It hadn’t lasted long. 

 

Gabriel braced himself for the next hit, the pain that he knew was coming, following Sam’s voice back to himself like Hansel and Gretel following breadcrumbs back home. 

 

Betrayal. Being sold to Asmodeus by the people who were his second family. Blood and torture and pain. The agony when they sewed his lips together, stitch by stich by stitch, it lanced through him. 

 

Gabriel staggered backwards, towards the safety of what he’d built, but he kept pushing forward, even ashis knees shook. 

 

Having his grace drained over and over, the pleasure with which Asmodeus abused him. It all hurt so much. He cried out for his father, for his brothers, for anyone to hear him and rescue him from the torture, but no one ever came. Eventually he stopped trying, he built a wall inside himself to shrink into when it got to be too much. He let himself grow numb. 

 

Gabriel remembered hearing his brother’s voice once. Even with Asmodeus stealing his grace, he was drawn to Lucifer’s light. He was so, so close now, he was here, but Gabriel had not the will to call to him, he had nothing left. He was never going to get out of this place. 

 

It turned out Fate had other plans for him. Gabriel had known what Arthur Ketch was the moment he had laid eyes on him, a monster in human skin. He could smell the blood on his hands, the shrieks of his victims, but there was also something else interesting about him. There was still light there, a small fractured part of him that wanted to repent, to do good. 

 

_ We need you.  _

 

It was that part of him that grabbed Gabriel and ran. Gabriel knew that it wasn’t about saving him, it was about sticking it to Asmodeus, about showing him that he didn’t own Ketch, but it was also about proving he could do something right, that he could give the Winchesters what they needed to make things right. 

 

Sam was the only person who could possibly understand what he’d been through, the only person who tried to talk to him on a personal level. Sam had been tortured by Lucifer, had clawed his way back from the brink and despite everything he’d been through because of Gabriel’s family, Sam still believed in him. 

 

He was so close now, looking at Sam’s face out of his own eyes, seeing how he cracked and broke with each passing moment of silence. His eyes were wet, and he blinked furiously as if trying to will it away. He looked so...broken, and that was all it took. 

 

_ Gabriel, I need you.  _

 

Sam sighed and walked towards the door, turning his back on Gabriel. 

 

"Porn stars,” Gabriel rasped out finally as Sam reached for the doorknob. 

 

Sam flipped around, his eyes round and wild, and Gabriel couldn’t resist throwing him a teasing smirk, his own eyes glowing with heavenly grace under his raised eyebrow. 

 

“They were porn stars, Sam.” 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gabriel couldn’t believe after all that he’d been through that they still had the audacity for ask him for help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't planning on writing a second part to this, buuuuuttt here's a little to tide everyone over until next week!

Gabriel couldn’t believe after all that he’d been through that they still had the audacity for ask him for help. 

He died for them… well fake died for them, but the sentiment was still there. He’d put his ass on the line for them, and he had nothing to show for it but years of pain and torture, and were they grateful? Not one bit. 

The very moment he’d gotten his power back, they were on his case about joining the team and fighting against another version of his dickhead brother. Where were they when he needed them, when Asmodouche had been sipping on him like a fucking juicebox? 

That’s right, they didn’t care! Even when he gave them points for not technically knowing he was alive, it still didn’t make it okay. He’d been free for five fucking minutes, and they couldn’t even let him have that. It was like they didn’t know him at all, like they had ignored every word that had come out of his mouth. 

He didn’t want to fight Michael here or in any universe. What did they not understand? 

Gabriel fumed, conjuring up various breakable things and smashing them over and over again. He thought about going into hiding again, getting as far away as he could get. He would have been well within his rights to just leave and enjoy himself for another couple centuries, but there was the small matter of his revenge. 

He knew it would be better if he just turned the other cheek, but selling him out was not something he could let pass. He’d considered them his family, he’d tried to save them from Lucifer. He’d made sure Kali was taken care of before taking on his brother, and she’d sold him out without a second thought. 

His blood boiled. He’d loved Kali, adored her even and she’d given him over to pain and torture to save her own skin. He couldn’t help but wonder if she’d planned this from the moment she’d figured out what he really was. What was more, he wondered if she’d ever loved him at all, or if he was just another disposable pawn in her game. 

Gabriel doubted that Kali had lost one wink of sleep over what she’d done to him. No one knew that he was alive, no one was coming to save him, so there was no risk that he would escape and come for her. She hadn’t accounted for the pride of a Former Men of Letter and the persistence and empathy of one long-haired Winchester. 

No, if he’d learned anything from being Loki for all these years, it was that he couldn’t allow to go unpunished. He knew she wouldn’t go down easily, but that wasn’t going to be a problem, he thought, with a smirk. There were three people who needed his help, and his help didn’t come cheap. 

Gabriel would get his revenge, and he knew just the bozos to help him do it.


End file.
